Robbie Birkner’s Blog

How nTLD Operators can Succeed with RegistrarOC

September 29, 2011

In my series of posts on new TLDs, the goal has always been to inform and provide insight, from the perspective of a registrar. With there being so much focus on ICANN and on registry operators during the initial stages of the nTLD process, we felt the voice of the registrar needed to be heard. This is because, from our perspective, success for any new TLD will greatly depend on its support of registrars.

My first post, “Does HEXONET Have Plans to be a REGISTRY Operator for newTLDs?“, was intended to make it clear that as a long standing registrar, our goal is to make any nTLD a success by doing what we have always done, by being a great registrar and nothing more. My second post, “Choosing a Registry Operator for New TLDs“, was done to help prospective registry operators think critically about there registry platform, probably the single biggest decision that will affect their registry today and for years to come. I wanted to give some key insights on registry platforms from our nearly ten years of operational knowledge as a registrar working with these various solutions and technologies.

Making It Easy for Registrars to Start Selling Your nTLD

Today’s post is to take the next step beyond the ICANN process and registry platforms, to start talking about registrars, the gatekeepers to the end customer. For a prospective registry, the biggest questions about registrars is how to get as many of them on board as quickly as possible. Most registrars are very busy selling domains, supporting domains, managing systems, and simply running their business. And for many registrars, engineering resources are tight or non-existent. As a result, for registrars, choosing to implement a nTLD requires a substantial return on investment.

Given that even adding one nTLD for a registrar is a commitment, how will the possibility of three, four or ten nTLD introductions in a given year affect that choice? Registry operators need to be cognizant of possible slow registrar acceptance and implementation. Sounds a bit scary right? The good news is that HEXONET has a solution called RegistrarOC (Registrar Operations Center) that helps registrar’s quickly, easily, and cost-effectively add any new TLD.

Help for Registrars in a Crowded nTLD Marketplace

Potentially hundreds of nTLDs will be available over the next years. Some of them are listed below. A more complete list of declared and potential applicants has been published by Kieren McCarthy, CEO of .NXT.

What if there was a way for registrars to simply add a nTLD to their sales system with little or no technical effort for registry integration, testing and on-going maintenance? In this scenario, registrars can then offer a nTLD as soon it is available, even offer pre-registration! This is exactly how HEXONET’s RegistrarOC solution helps registry operators and registrars.

HEXONET’s RegistrarOC solution takes away all the technical and engineering overhead for registrars. Designed to be plug and play, once a registrar is connected with the RegistrarOC solution, adding a nTLD is as simple as throwing a switch (add an accreditation and go!). We even help and guide new businesses become accredited or help existing registrars quickly add new accreditations.

HEXONET has successfully managed a comprehensive and extensive portfolio of gTLDs and ccTLDs accreditations for nearly a decade. We specialize in inter-operating with all the registry platforms at industry leading reliability and performance. So with RegistrarOC, not only do registrars plug in to the technology, but more importantly, they also plug in to all the operational and engineering expertise garnered by HEXONET over the years.

Ensure you are in compliance with various ICANN requirements, such as RDE (Registrar Data Escrow), WDRP (Whois-Data-Reminder-Policy), …etc.

Ensure your data is always in-sync with the registry – a highly underestimated task by registrars that is potential very expensive future cost

If you are interested in learning more then either visit the “RegistrarOC” solutions page or send us an email at sales@hexonet.net. We would be happy to arrange a quick conference call to explain the product in more detail.